We were raised in an Italian-American household, although we didn't speak Italian in the house. We were very proud of being Italian, and had Italian music, ate Italian food.

Frank Capra was a prop man, I think. John Ford was a prop man. It was a little bit of a father and son thing, and you kind of worked your way up.

They needed someone to write a script of The Great Gatsby very quickly for the movie they were making. I took this job so I'd be sure to have some dough to support my family.

I remember growing up with television, from the time it was just a test pattern, with maybe a little bit of programming once in a while.

I don't think there's any artist of any value who doesn't doubt what they're doing.

The stuff that I got in trouble for, the casting for The Godfather or the flag scene in Patton, was the stuff that was remembered, and was considered the good work.

When I was going for my graduate degree, I decided I was going to make a feature film as my thesis. That's what I was famous for-that I had my thesis film be a feature film, which was 'You're a Big Boy Now.'

I had an older brother who was very interested in literature, so I had an early exposure to literature, and and theater. My father sometimes would work in musical comedies.

I wrote the script of Patton. I had this very bizarre opening where he stands up in front of an American flag and gives this speech. Ultimately, I was fired. When the script was done, they hired another writer and that script was forgotten.

Roger Corman exploited all of the young people who worked for him, but he really gave you responsibility and opportunity. So it was kind of a fair deal.

I was the kind of kid that had some talents or ability, but it never came out in school.

When I was about 9, I had polio, and people were very frightened for their children, so you tended to be isolated. I was paralyzed for a while, so I watched television.

I landed a job with Roger Corman. The job was to write the English dialogue for a Russian science fiction picture. I didn't speak any Russian. He didn't care whether I could understand what they were saying; he wanted me to make up dialogue.

When I do a novel, I don't really use the script, I use the book; when I did Apocalypse Now, I used Heart of Darkness. Novels usually have so much rich material.

In kindergarten that used to be my job, to tell them fairytales. I liked Hans Christian Andersen, and the Grimm fairy tales, all the classic fairy tales.

You're in a profession in which absolutely everybody is telling you their opinion, which is different. That's one of the reasons George Lucas never directed again.

We were raised in an Italian-American household, although we didn't speak Italian in the house. We were very proud of being Italian, and had Italian music, ate Italian food.

I liked to work in a shop down in the basement and invent things and build gadgets.

Art depends on luck and talent.

It's ironic that at age 32, at probably the greatest moment of my career, with The Godfather having such an enormous success, I wasn't even aware of it, because I was somewhere else under the deadline again.

I had a heartbreaking experience when I was 9. I always wanted to be a guard. The most wonderful girl in the world was a guard. When I got polio and then went back to school, they made me a guard. A teacher took away my guard button.

Listen, if there's one sure-fire rule that I have learned in this business, it's that I don't know anything about human nature.

Usually, the stuff that's your best idea or work is going to be attacked the most.

Most Italians who came to this country are very patriotic. There was this exciting possibility that if you worked real hard, and you loved something, you could become successful.

I became quite successful very young, and it was mainly because I was so enthusiastic and I just worked so hard at it.

I always found the film world unpleasant. It's all about the schedule, and never really flew for me.

A number of images put together a certain way become something quite above and beyond what any of them are individually.

We had access to too much money, too much equipment, and little by little, we went insane.

I remember teachers who really singled me out for their discouragement.

I had a number of teachers who hated me. I didn't do well in school.

I think cinema, movies, and magic have always been closely associated. The very earliest people who made film were magicians.

You have to really be courageous about your instincts and your ideas. Otherwise you'll just knuckle under, and things that might have been memorable will be lost.

I had a number of very strong personalities in my family. My father was a concert flutist, the solo flute for Toscanini.

Anything you build on a large scale or with intense passion invites chaos.

I associate my motion picture career more with being unhappy and scared, or being under the gun, than with anything pleasant.

George Lucas doesn't have the most physical stamina. He was so unhappy making Star Wars that he just vowed he'd never do it again.

The professional world was much more unpleasant than I thought. I was always wishing I could get back that enthusiasm I had when I was doing shows at college.

The essence of cinema is editing. It's the combination of what can be extraordinary images of people during emotional moments, or images in a general sense, put together in a kind of alchemy.

I thought I wanted to be a playwright because I was interested in stories and telling stories.

My film is not a movie; it's not about Vietnam. It is Vietnam.

I had been a kid that moved so much, I didn't have a lot of friends. Theater really represented camaraderie.

You ought to love what you're doing because, especially in a movie, over time you really will start to hate it.

Ten Days That Shook The World, by Eisenstein, I went to see it, and I was so impressed with this film, so impressed with what cinema could do.

'Godfather' was very classical - the way it was shot, the style - the whole driving force of it was more classical, almost Shakespearean.

'The Godfather' changed my life, for better or worse. It definitely made me have an older man's film career when I was 29.

All of a sudden, there are great Japanese films, or great Italian films, or great Australian films. It's usually because there are a number of people that cross-pollinated each other.

Anyone who's made film and knows about the cinema has a lifelong love affair with the experience. You never stop learning about film.

As long as I can make lots of money in other businesses, I'll continue to subsidize my own work.

Being a former theater student, of course, there is a part of me that is fascinated with stage crafts and what you can do with illusions and working within the confines of the studio.